Astronaut Talks About Missions, Challenges

Currie, a veteran of four space missions amounting to more than 1,000 hours in space, spoke about her experiences as an astronaut.

The feature of the presentation was a film of Currie's most recent mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope.

The 12-day mission was a grueling one. It included five space walks in a row during which the telescope was serviced.

"It is quite an event to be up there for 12 days," Currie said. "About six days into it, we were sleeping four hours a night."

The program was organized by Spacetalk, a student organization started last year by Kate Harris, a sophomore biology major, as a way to promote the space sciences and bring them to students interested in the field.

"We are just a bunch of kids who are really passionate about space exploration," Harris said.

Last year's speaker was Robert Zubrin, an advocate of Mars exploration.

Harris said she hopes to bring at least one speaker to the University each year.

After a technical discussion of the Hubble mission, Currie answered some of the audience's more down-to-earth questions about space travel.

The audience asked everything from "What do you do in your spare time?" to questions about why the Russians allow people to pay to fly into space.

Currie said astronauts' spare time is mostly spent staring down at the earth, but her answer regarding the Russian space program was more complicated.

"The reality is the Russians are very, very strapped," she said. She said that for the Russians to meet their budget, it is necessary for them to accept paying customers.

But it is not likely that the U.S. space program will be doing anything like that in the future.

"You will never see the U.S. have paid positions on the shuttle," she said.

This might have disappointed some of the audience, which was made up of children, parents and students, but they were too interested in the rest of the program to care.

Freshman Harry Chizhikov was alerted to the program by the Academic Enhancement Program, but he said he has always had an interest in space-related topics.

"In high school, I have done many projects in that field," he said. "I just think it is interesting."

Graduate student Adam Hall said he was happy with Currie. "The talk itself was fantastic," he said.

But Hall said that his reason for attending was not frivolous and that the speech relates to his studies. "I came here because I want to be an astronaut."

But it would be good for the future astronaut to remember that space exploration is not all fun and games.

Currie said going back to earth can be difficult. "The transition back to real life is one of the most trying parts of being an astronaut."

The University Editor can be reached at udesk@unc.edu.